Faking with Benefits : A Friends to Lovers Romance(107)

They have been ringing me, Josh especially, but I haven’t answered. I can’t. They’re letting people run with these stories, and it makes me sick to my stomach. It’s one thing to say they don’t want to date me; it’s another to let me be publicly embarrassed and not step in to defend me.

The worst part is, I can’t even defend myself. I’ve got plenty of experience with bullying. I know how it works. The guys have a whole mob of fans on their side, and I have no one. If I try to argue with them, it’ll just fan the flames. I need the boys to stand up and defend me, but for whatever reason, they’re not doing it.

Another email notification dings up on my laptop, and my jaw locks as I read the subject header.

I found an article you might enjoy. Eat dirt you ugly ho.





The attachment is titled ‘Ten Ways to End it All’.

Something breaks inside me. Tears flood my eyes, and my stomach suddenly churns. I barely have enough time to shove aside my laptop and dodge for the ensuite bathroom before I’m throwing up in the porcelain toilet bowl. I’ve not eaten properly in days, so bile burns my throat, choking me as I kneel on the cold marble and heave, over and over.

By the time my stomach finally settles, my hands are shaking. I’m sweating all over. Little pricks of light are dancing over my vision. I flush the toilet and flop down onto the floor, wrapping my arms around my knees and breathing hard as old, half-buried memories pound through my mind. Teachers mocking me. Girls laughing at me. Boys whistling and catcalling and grabbing me. I rub my face, trying to shut them off, but they just get louder and more vivid, washing over me in great big heavy waves until I can’t even sit upright anymore.

God knows how long it takes me to calm down. It feels like hours. Eventually, I end up just lying on the tile, my heart pounding out of my chest, tears trickling down the sides of my nose.

This isn’t the first time this has happened in the last few days. The heartbreak is bad enough, but it’s the harassment that’s really been hurting me. It’s like all the old anxiety I felt when I was sixteen has flooded back. I can’t eat because of the knot in my stomach. I can’t sleep, and whenever I do drop off, I wake up in cold sweats. I feel like I’m going crazy.

As I lay on my hotel bathroom’s mirror-shine floor, defeat washes over me. I can’t do this anymore. I can’t. It’s killing me. Something has got to change.

Standing shakily, I head back into the bedroom, opening my laptop again and bringing up my email. With trembling fingers, I tap out a quick message to Anna Bardet Couture, giving her assistant the phone number of my hotel room, and letting her know that my work number and email will be unavailable until further notice. Then I finally shut down my laptop and power off my phone.

Immediately, relief floods me. Climbing weakly back into bed, I reach for my sketchbook, snuggling down with it.

I’ve spent the last few days trying to distract myself by working on design proposals for this weekend’s meeting with Anna. So far, I already have four sketches incorporating my butterfly design into her own style, but none of them are good enough. They need to be perfect. There’s now more riding on the collaboration with Anna Bardet than there ever was before.

I’ve looked through some New York real estate sites. Even a small apartment is ridiculously expensive, but if Anna ends up offering me a contract, I should be making enough to live and work in the city. And right now, moving to America is looking more and more attractive every day.

I glance at my suitcase, lying open by the foot of my bed. In just a few days, I’m finally getting out of here. Then I can put this whole mess behind me.

Hopefully forever.





SIXTY-EIGHT





LUKE





Saturday is the first day of London PodFest, and as we step inside the convention hall, the atmosphere is electric. I look around the atrium, squinting past the bright lights and chattering hordes of people. Josh and Zack hang behind me, silently seething at each other, and I sigh, trying to block them out.

Today is going to be a terrible day.

None of us wants to be here. We considered cancelling our appearance altogether, but so many of our fans had bought tickets just to see us live. We couldn’t let them down. I called the convention organisers a few days ago and managed to wrangle us out of our guest panels, but we still have the live show scheduled in an hour, and it’s going to be rough. I’m sure there will be a lot of questions about Layla.

My chest starts to ache.

I miss her. So much. It’s been a week. She hasn’t come home. She hasn’t answered any of our calls. She hasn’t responded to any of our messages. Josh and I have been trying every day, multiple times a day, but we never get through.

I don’t know what to do. Ever since the pictures of her at the wedding have gotten out, the social media rumours have spiralled out of control. A reality star tweeted about the scandal a few days ago, and now the photos are going viral. It’s unbelievable. We’ve never gotten this much attention before. There are news outlets posting about the story online. Buzz Tone has chimed in with a statement. Every hour, we’re getting inundated with tweets and messages and DMs. And almost every single one of them is bashing Layla.

I look over the convention hall, blankly watching the crowd chatting and laughing with each other as they visit the brightly coloured booths set up throughout the auditorium. Each exhibition table is heaping with merchandise. Con-goers with shiny lanyards around their necks wait in long queues around podcast hosts, clutching memorabilia and notepads, waiting for autographs.